CVE-2023-52739

Fix page corruption caused by racy check in __free_pages

MEDIUM
5.5
CVSS Score
Published: May 21, 2024 at 03:23 PM UTC
Updated: August 5, 2026 at 10:24 AM UTC
1 product affected across 1 vendorLinux Kernel

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Severity
MEDIUM5.5
Exploit prediction
EPSS 0.3%
SSVC
No known exploit

Description

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: Fix page corruption caused by racy check in __free_pages When we upgraded our kernel, we started seeing some page corruption like the following consistently: BUG: Bad page state in process ganesha.nfsd pfn:1304ca page:0000000022261c55 refcount:0 mapcount:-128 mapping:0000000000000000 index:0x0 pfn:0x1304ca flags: 0x17ffffc0000000() raw: 0017ffffc0000000 ffff8a513ffd4c98 ffffeee24b35ec08 0000000000000000 raw: 0000000000000000 0000000000000001 00000000ffffff7f 0000000000000000 page dumped because: nonzero mapcount CPU: 0 PID: 15567 Comm: ganesha.nfsd Kdump: loaded Tainted: P B O 5.10.158-1.nutanix.20221209.el7.x86_64 #1 Hardware name: VMware, Inc. VMware Virtual Platform/440BX Desktop Reference Platform, BIOS 6.00 04/05/2016 Call Trace: dump_stack+0x74/0x96 bad_page.cold+0x63/0x94 check_new_page_bad+0x6d/0x80 rmqueue+0x46e/0x970 get_page_from_freelist+0xcb/0x3f0 ? _cond_resched+0x19/0x40 __alloc_pages_nodemask+0x164/0x300 alloc_pages_current+0x87/0xf0 skb_page_frag_refill+0x84/0x110 ... Sometimes, it would also show up as corruption in the free list pointer and cause crashes. After bisecting the issue, we found the issue started from commit e320d3012d25 ("mm/page_alloc.c: fix freeing non-compound pages"): if (put_page_testzero(page)) free_the_page(page, order); else if (!PageHead(page)) while (order-- > 0) free_the_page(page + (1 << order), order); So the problem is the check PageHead is racy because at this point we already dropped our reference to the page. So even if we came in with compound page, the page can already be freed and PageHead can return false and we will end up freeing all the tail pages causing double free.

Affected

Our own answer: ranges merged, affected separated from platform-only, with confidence and review flags.

v ≥ 5.9.25.10 ≤ v < 5.10.1685.10 ≤ v < 5.15.945.10 ≤ v < 6.1.125.10 ≤ v < 6.25.11 ≤ v < 5.15.945.16 ≤ v < 6.1.125.9.2 ≤ v < 5.105.9.2 ≤ v < 5.10.1685.9.26.2 rc16.2 rc26.2 rc36.2 rc46.2 rc56.2 rc66.2 rc7830b103831a924a23af48562c4d274696e75ab4fe320d3012d25b1fb5f3df4edb7bd44a1c362ec10
Vendor states this is fixed in 0a626e27f984dfbe96bd8e4fd08f20a2ede3ea23 (fixed)
Vendor states this is fixed in 3af734f3eac6f70ef8e272a80da40544b9d0f2b5 (fixed)
Vendor states this is fixed in 3b4c045a98f53a8890a94bb5846a390c8e39e673 (fixed)
Vendor states this is fixed in 462a8e08e0e6287e5ce13187257edbf24213ed03 (fixed)
Vendor states this is fixed in 5.10 (unaffected)
Vendor states this is fixed in 5.10.168 (unaffected)
Vendor states this is fixed in 5.15.94 (unaffected)
Vendor states this is fixed in 6.1.12 (unaffected)
Vendor states this is fixed in 6.2 (unaffected)

References (4)

Patch
Source: 416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67
https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/0a626e27f984dfbe96bd8e4fd08f20a2ede3ea23
Patch
Source: 416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67
https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/3af734f3eac6f70ef8e272a80da40544b9d0f2b5
Patch
Source: 416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67
https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/3b4c045a98f53a8890a94bb5846a390c8e39e673
Patch
Source: 416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67
https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/462a8e08e0e6287e5ce13187257edbf24213ed03

SSVC — Action Prioritization

SSVCNo known exploitNot automatablePartial impact

SSVC signals action urgency (what to patch first), separate from CVSS which measures severity.

CVSS

Attack Vector
LOCAL
Complexity
LOW
Privileges
LOW
User Interaction
NONE
Scope
UNCHANGED
Confidentiality
NONE
Integrity
NONE
Availability
HIGH
Vector?

Quick Info

StatusMODIFIED
CWE
CWE-415

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